What chance does any housing strategy stand without agreement on the target?
With so many property reports issued over the past quarter, you may have missed a recent one by Bank of America focusing on Ireland’s housing market. Why is this report more important than other, perhaps more locally-nuanced, reports? Simple, it is a matter of influence. As important as it is to be fully informed on…
Read More“Widening mismatch” between housing demand and supply
Despite the ongoing pandemic restrictions, house prices across Ireland increased 4.5 percent year-on-year in April. This is the fastest level of growth recorded since 2018. Property within the capital saw the lowest annual increases, rising an average of 3.65 percent over that 12-month period, whereas property outside of Dublin saw increases of 5.4 percent. It…
Read MoreForewarned is Forearmed, Or Not
The scenario warned about through a series of economic reports is now upon us, what can be done at this stage? Earlier this week the Economic and Social Research Institute, or ESRI, finally articulated what it has been signalling for a number of years now; Ireland’s Government will need to double the existing level of…
Read MoreCommission on Housing Proposed
After a few trying weeks for our politicians with responsibility for housing, it has been reported that Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien is to bring a memo to Cabinet before the end of this week proposing the establishment of a Commission on Housing. This has been muted many times in the past decades, however – given that…
Read More“There is no action that doesn’t have repercussions”
It has been the busiest policy week for Irish property in more than a decade. It is difficult to know where to start; vacant property, affordability, investment funds, stamp duty hikes… Section 28 guidelines on the Regulation of Commercial Institutional Investmentin Housing: By now, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien will have issued the circular to all local…
Read MoreWhat would a triage approach to housing look like?
Property market commentary has taken quite a surprising turn in recent days. With data showing the current generation as the first in modern history to have lower standards of living than their parents, it is clear that something needs to change. But what? If there was only one right answer, it would have emerged by…
Read MoreIrish Property Does Not Need to Roar
There are few words as loaded in meaning to Irish construction and real estate veterans as ‘Celtic Tiger’. Certainly, people emerged from that time as winners or losers; but in real terms, no one came through unscathed. With that in mind, very few will have welcomed The Irish Times headline yesterday which read: ‘Celtic Tiger poised to reawaken’.…
Read MoreBlurring the lines between public and private
The private rented sector, or PRS, in Ireland has changed significantly over the past decade and the emergence of build to rent, or BTR, as a new asset class is driving further changes. These changes have been broadly criticised outside of the industry for a whole range of reasons, from lack of affordability to the…
Read MoreCork Development Market Attracts New Interest
Last week we referenced the latest CBRE report on development land deals in Ireland, which showed that the combined value of development land transacted in Q1 was less than half the average quarterly combined transaction value over the last five years. However, the performance of the sector in the first three months of 2021 was…
Read MoreCalculating the Cost of the Pandemic
Earlier this week, somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 construction workers returned to non-essential project sites all around the country as part of the phased reopening of the industry. According to a report carried out by EY/DKM on behalf of the Construction Industry Federation, or CIF, which was published last month, the initial shutdown of the…
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